8 November 2001 Edition

A cross-party delegation of Flemish MPs and human rights activists, including barrister Piet de Pauw, travelled to South Armagh last Friday, 2 November, and criticised the slow pace of British demilitarisation in the area. Free article

The British government violated the rights of a County Tyrone Catholic after the Secretary of State rejected him for a job in the North's civil service, according to a ruling of the European Court of Human Rights. Free article

Martina Anderson from Derry, who was in jail for 13 years, mostly in Durham in England, and who now works at the Assembly, took an evening off last week to come up to Dublin to talk with a group of ex-prisoners and a number of young Sinn Féin activists about the political difficulties of working in Stormont. Free article

It took just 15 minutes for the lives of 320 people and their families to be turned upside down last week. At 3pm last Thursday, 1 November, the workers of US owned AFL Ireland were told they were to lose their jobs between now and next March. AFL produces automobile components for Volkswagen and Audi and has been in Ireland for 14 years. Free article

So what is the Dublin government doing in the face of the mounting job losses and a clear recession ripping through the economy? The Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) predicted this week that there is up to another 12 months of recession still coming. That means 12 more months of job losses and households left facing mortgage arrears and many other costs. Free article

An estimated 3,000 people marched through the streets of Dublin last Saturday to protest the war in Afghanistan, where, according to Labour Party TD Michael D Higgins, "one of the world's most technologically advanced nation is bombing some of the most oppressed and poorest people in the world". Free article

Remzi Kartal, an executive member of the Kurdistan National Congress and Latif Serhildan visited the Coiste na nIarchimí offices in Dublin last week to talk with republican ex-prisoners about their ongoing struggle for recognition of the national rights of Kurdistan which, including its Diaspora, numbers over 40 million people. There are over 5 million in Iraq, 19 million in Iran and 1.5 million in Syria. Free article

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